Garden of Gondor
by Altariel
Summary: A place to collect drabbles and other pieces from the Fourth Age, involving the Prince of Ithilien and his family.
1. Role Reversal

**Role Reversal**

_Emyn Arnen, early in the Fourth Age_

Perhaps, given their heritage and the world they inhabited, the games were inevitable. Under the bright sunlight of the new age, they rode and quested and triumphed in safety. They scaled mountains together, broke bridges together, rode out to relieve a city together.

And, of course, there was the very best game of all.

"You look upon a _woman_!" Morwen cries out across the radiant garden. "Begone, foul dwimmerlaik!"

"Is that me?" Elboron asks, uncertainly. Sometimes the women of his family are a challenge.

"_What_?" his sister says. Sometimes her chief lieutenant is obtuse. "Don't be stupid! You're the _hobbit_!"


	2. Ships that Pass

**Ships that Pass**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

That whole summer, Elves have been passing through. Each night, in the week before Midsummer, Léof waits for moon-rise, slips from the house, and out into the blue-black calm of the warm starry night. Beyond the side gate there is an old tree, an old friend. Léof climbs its welcoming branches, sits for an hour or two, and watches.

Returning to the house, stealing through the kitchens on his way back up to bed, he meets his father. Father puts a finger to his lips. _Hush_. Reflected in his eyes, Léof can still see starlight. They swap smiles. _Our secret._


	3. Safekeeping

**Safe-keeping**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

Elboron was the finder, although he fell upon the treasure by accident, crashing through rotting planks of wood, landing solidly upon the damp dark earth below.

"Bron…?" I called down anxiously, fearing broken bones.

But my brother had struck gold: curved swords in pocked scabbards; broken trinkets; a tarnished serpent crest. Best of all, the bones themselves, still clothed in raggedy red. Spoils of war._ Who,_ we wondered. _How?_

We took Léof there when he was bigger. He fingered our finds thoughtfully, and listened with respect to our grave stories. But we never told Father. It would only worry him.


	4. Hunt It, Kill It, Cook It

**Hunt It, Kill It, Cook It**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

Léof likes a quiet life. He sees his future self as a Ranger, far from company, self-reliant. His father's experience differs – and he has a troop of co-conspirators to call upon. Most boys have childhood friends like this only in imagination.

With a sharp-eyed Elf he steals through the woods, one hand upon his bow, the other gesturing, signalling, speaking without words. With a round-faced Halfling, he forages, fetches water, seasons and shares food. With a weather-beaten King, he sets fires, swaps watches, fills hour upon hour with silent comradeship.

From his careful father, he learns the vitality of fellowship.


	5. Still Room

**Still Room**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

Barring the children from the still room this summer was, Éowyn thinks, the second best decision of her life. Here, all is fierce order – material proof of her skill, capability, and art.

Outside, the chaos of young voices continues unabated, as it will for years – laughter, shrieks, the occasional yell. Eight children, family and friends, make a royal racket. Hardly noticing what she does, Éowyn untangles the voices one by one, interprets them… And stays in her seat. Nobody is hurt.

The door opens. A kingly head looks inside. "Headache," says her liege-lord and healer. Éowyn points to the shelf.


	6. White Lady, With Lamp

**White Lady, With Lamp**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

In the years after, so many of them came that a house was built in a tranquil valley where Elves now dwelt. Young men no more, the horror of that past still shaped their desolate present. Elf-song soothed them – but it was she they wanted, Lady Wraithbane, whose deed felled a dread king.

And Éowyn welcomed each of them, and fought for them, and ordered a fair house for them. But their devotion baffled her. She never quite grasped what her husband always knew – that pity was hers too, and the healing love can be strong as well as gentle.


	7. Black Magic

**Black Magic**

_Ithilien, in the Fourth Age_

Wizards and monsters may have left the world, but enchantment remains, found suddenly in familiar places.

The forge stands at the foot of the hill. Morwen has passed by most days, but never before entered. Today she stands for a spell on the threshold, watching the smith at work, and each morning thereafter she comes back, mesmerised by his elemental craft. Metal bends to him; fire obeys him; air and water do his will.

After a week, he offers her the hammer. A shaky first attempt. So he teaches patience, respect for skill and tool, the humility of true mastery.


	8. All Gold

**All Gold**

_Emyn Arnen, F.A. 5_

He was standing by our Elf-friend at the far end of the garden. Absolutely and completely no doubt about it, this was—

"A _giant_!" gasped Bron.

"Stupid! He's not as tall as Papa!"

"But his _beard_!"

"He's hardly as tall as _you_!"

There was lots of grown-up talk about metal and gates and things, but there were toys for both of us too, golden toys with keys and wheels that whirred. Bron got an eagle that flew. I got a dragon that puffed and roared. And there was a sun-and-moon-twisting-thing which didn't make sense until much later when Léof arrived.


	9. Work Life Balance

**Work-Life Balance**

_Minas Tirith, in the Fourth Age_

He will be late again for dinner. It cannot be helped. Tomorrow morning the council meets, and he has not touched those papers yet. Across the room his daughter prowls. Recently she has been watching every scratch of his pen, every forkful of food.

"Out with it," he says, at last.

"You never do _anything_ for yourself! You should… you should find yourself a hobby!"

She is beautiful, on the cusp of womanhood. Fierce as her mother on his account. His life's work: leaving her the world he never had.

"I already have a hobby, blackbird. I call it Gondor."


	10. Land of Gifts

**Land of Gifts**

_Ithilien, F.A. 82_

Throughout the spring, Gondor mourns its Steward and Ithilien mourns its Prince. In the summer, the Prince goes home, friend and father laid to rest.

Here healing is already underway. The year's rhythms pulse. The groves and orchards swell. The harvest will be generous: better than the last year's, less so than the year before. In the villages, men and women work and play, live and love. At Midsummer they will dance.

His father and his mother made this from ashes. Now the children hold the trust for a while: to tend and to maintain, and – in time – to deliver.


End file.
